HPDI and ethanol

[robm]

I have a 2001 HPDI with about 150 hours. On Long Island Sound, the fuel contains ethanol and it’s wreaking havoc with this motor. It appears that the fuel filter on the outbound side of the vapor separator lasts only 3 weeks or so. I’m installing the 3rd one of the season now, at $80 a pop. The filter on the base of the fuel pump lasts only a bit longer. It’s only $50, too. The motor has only 15-20 hours use this season and we no longer have any confidence in it. The entire fuel system is new, so there’s no crud making its way into these filters.

My question is this: Are all of the Yamaha motors that run on fuel containing ethanal experiencing this type of problem or is it related to the HPDI models only?

[alwaysreadytofish]

I have a 2000 200 hp HPDI with 500 hours, and run fuel from Costco (wil check if it contains ethanol) and have had absolutely no problems.

[jb123]

there have been at least a half a dozen posts about this issue from owners from the northeast and sounds like it causes different motors problems.

[Hamfisted]

Rob are you using a Racor fuel/water seperator filter in the fuel line before it goes up to the motor? The filter on the motor itself is not very large and I think most people have found that using the Racor filter has helped that problem.


Mike

[robm]

I have a 10 micron Racor separator with only about 15 hours on it. It's working just fine, since I can see in the bowl the ethanol that has migrated out of the gas in phase separation. I assume it's also working as a filter.

Yamaha Customer service, in a phone call this morning, said that the problem is happening in all models with fuel injection and virtually none of the carburated models. They don't have a fix, though they have a new transom mount filter that "may help" (their words).

They also stated that this sort of failure is not covered by their warranty!

Time to find a carburated motor, I guess.